Footnotes For The Lose
by Tricki
Summary: What's My Line? Part 2.  Giles finds something in his library that he wouldn't expect to find there: his slayer.  Reading.


AN: Set after What's My Line, Part 2, with Kendra. I found this cleaning up my hard disk tonight, and thought it deserved its moment in the sun {internet?}. Any typos etc are my bad - it's late and I'm tired :P Hope you enjoy.

**Footnotes For The Lose**

Rupert Giles is a man who would be lying if he said it was uncommon for him to jump with surprise. He would also be lying if he said surprise often caused confusion in him.

These two facts he would dwell on later that night, for a chance encounter with his Slayer had caused him to do both.

Giles frowned as he shuffled through the large stack of books in his arms, trying to find the sixth volume of the writings of Drameus. His conversation with Kendra the day before had started an angry niggling in his brain – there was a book that the – _a_ – Slayer had read which he'd passed off as too difficult. It was an understatement to say the idea sat badly with him; it shook him to his very core.

Had he perhaps left it on the table? He wondered this idly as he rounded the corner into the correct stack, and visibly jumped, making a slight yelping noise when he saw a figure there. He had neither cross nor stake on him, and his brain was racing to find a convenient alternative; however, when he stopped and looked at the strangely folded shape in front of him, trying to decide what he was facing, he realised it was merely his Slayer, his Buffy.

"Buffy..." He sighed her name loudly and shakily. He tried to straighten his glasses, which had ended up slightly askew from his leap of surprise, but found his hand shaking so badly that he had more of a chance of poking his eye out than righting his glasses. Carefully he studied her, trying to work out what had alerted him to her presence – it was her lifting a can of Diet Doctor Pepper to her lips. He shuddered – he'd only tasted the dreaded stuff once, but he was borderline scarred by it.

Suddenly he paled. "B-Buffy" was all he managed in his state of near panic.

She was audibly pouting when she said: "I don't know what you guys were whining about. There aren't _that_ many footnotes."

He knew he should've been more sympathetic – she sounded upset – but the librarian in him took over when he noticed four other empty cans of that damnable liquid. He took the current one out of her hand.

"Buffy, do you have any idea how old that book on your lap is?" Buffy looked up at her Watcher now and noted that he was especially pale. Was he still her Watcher, really? She pondered dejectedly. She caught herself and flicked to the front of the volume.

"Nope. There's no publishing date." The stare he fixed on her was fraught with disbelief, until a smile broke over his features and he began to laugh.

Buffy's brow furrowed in confusion. "What?"

Giles carefully collected the four cans that sat beside her, noting that they had all been crushed – her assumed by Buffy's hand – and sank to the floor next to her.

He shook his head, still chuckling lightly; "This book pre-dates publishing, Buffy. It was written before Columbus discovered America."

"Oh... That's pretty old." She stated lamely.

"Buffy..." He began, becoming awkward. She turned large eyes on him. "You really don't need to try and impress me."

"Come on, Giles, your pants would be seriously on fire if you said you wouldn't like me to be more book-y."

The Watcher's brow furrowed with confusion. "I'm going to assume you mean trousers, but I'm still not sure where in this conversation spontaneous combustion became a point of contention."

"'Liar liar pants on fire' not ringing any bells? I thought you knew about poetry."

Comprehension crossed Giles' face. "Buffy, you're my slayer. Perhaps we're not the most technically perfect pair; but we are a pair, you and I. Wh-what I'm – I'm _trying_ to say is that I - I wouldn't change you."

Buffy smiled widely. "Thanks, Giles." She rested her head on his shoulder and scooted closer to him, moving the book so he could see it too. "Now, can you explain this book to me? There are crazed amounts of footnotes..."


End file.
